The well-known atheist, Richard Dawkins, concludes his TV series, "The Root of all Evil—The Virus of Faith," with a simple plea: "The here and now is all we have, so make the most of it." What "make the most of it" is in practice will vary immensely, especially in our secular societies. Sadly, Dawkins does not tell us what he had in mind. Of course, for Dawkins there is no future beyond this life, and any emphasis on it he would see as being deleterious for a person’s behavior in the present. It is true that some people incinerate abortion clinics or bomb buses with the cry, "Glory to God," and suppose thereby that they have secured a blessed afterlife. A wrong view of the future can certainly wreak havoc in the present. However, a healthy emphasis on the future helps us "to make the most of the here and now" in a wholesome manner.

It was those who sustained hope, who best survived the concentration camps of World War II and other like deprivations. Hope is not an abandonment of the present for some pie-in-the-sky fantasy, but the very means by which we direct our lives in the here and now. God is a God of hope (Rom. 15:13), and those who place their hope and trust in him will allow their conduct to be shaped by that hope.1 "Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is. And all who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure" (1 John 3:2–3).

Paul speaks of "the hope laid up for you in heaven," and then brings it powerfully down to earth:

You have heard of this hope before in the word of the truth, the gospel that has come to you. Just as it is bearing fruit and growing in the whole world, so it has been bearing fruit among yourselves from the day you heard it and truly comprehended the grace of God…so that you may lead lives worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, as you bear fruit in every good work and as you grow in the knowledge of God. (Col. 1:5–6, 10).

Paul is the apostle of hope. The verb ελπιζω (I hope) occurs thirty-one times in the New Testament, and nineteen (61 percent) of these occurrences are in Paul’s letters.2 The noun ελπις (hope) is found fifty-three times in the New Testament and thirty-six (68 percent) of these examples occur in Paul’s epistles.3 He speaks of the gentiles as being without hope ("remember that you were at that time without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world," Eph. 2:12), and dying without hope ("But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about those who have died, so that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope," 1 Thess. 4:13). But the advent of Christ changed that; he is in their midst and in their hearts and has become their hope of sharing in the glory of God (Col. 1:27). Christ is their hope (1 Tim. 1:1); they hope in his name (Matt. 12:21), and we all have the hope of participating in the glory of God (Rom. 5:2).

Paul speaks of the "hope of righteousness" (Gal. 5:5), the "hope of the gospel" (Col. 1:23), and the "hope of salvation" (1 Thess. 5:8). All these give the idea of gaining final acceptance with God as a goal to pursue. Hence, Paul speaks of the endurance of hope (1 Thess. 1:3). This does not remove present confidence, but reminds us that the new life we have in Christ is one that must be lived out in the marketplace of our daily lives. Part of that future is, of course, "the hope of eternal life" (Titus 1:2; 3:7) or "the hope of the resurrection" (Acts 23:6). But, again, this is not a selfish fixation on one’s own continuing existence, but a focus on God as the Giver of life. That focus shapes the way we live now. To have God’s friendship, is to be his friend forever (Mark 12:26–27).

If God is the God of peace (Rom. 15:33; 16:20; 1 Cor. 13:11; Phil. 4:9; 1 Thess. 5:23; 2 Thess. 3:16; Heb. 13:20), the God of all grace (1 Pet. 5:10), the God of patience (Rom. 15:5), the God of trustworthiness (Titus 1:2), and the Father of mercies and God of all comfort (2 Cor. 1:3), so should his people be. Eternal life is life with God, and that is a relationship believers experience now with all its life-changing power. "Hope" often forms a trilogy with "faith" and "love" (1 Cor. 13:13; Gal. 5:5–6; 1 Thess. 1:3; 5:8; Heb. 6:10–12; 1 Pet. 1:21–22). Love prevents hope from becoming self-centered, and faith reminds us that hope is grounded in trust in God.

Tim Flannery’s book, The Weather Makers: The History and Future Impact of Climate Change, is the most disturbing book I have ever read. The book’s enigmatic title becomes clear on reading the text, for "we are the generation fated to live in the most interesting of times, for we are now the weather makers."4 It is sobering to realize that the biggest threat to the world is not wars, or the rumors of them, terrorism, or suicide bombers, but nice people like myself who drive a car, have ducted air-conditioning, take holidays overseas, and heat their water with electrical power generated by coal-burning power stations. Yes, nice people like me helped propel with the ubiquitous spray can five hundred thousand tons per year (as at 1975) of CFCs into the atmosphere, and by so doing punched a hole in the ozone layer with near calamitous results. We seem to have escaped that near disaster by a fluke meeting of two scientists and the fact that chlorine is cheaper than the more destructive (that is, of ozone) bromine.5

The parlous state of our world brought about by these seemingly innocent activities could reduce a person to despair—the very antithesis of hope. No doubt at both the personal and national levels we shall have to change the way we source our power supply. In the meantime, we are not driven to despair, for God’s activity in the past has given us confidence that "by the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope" (Rom. 15:4). Indeed, a blessed hope (Titus 2:13). "For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience" (Rom. 8:24–25). With patience, but not idleness or complacency, and, yes, we are going to install a solar hot water system.

Notes and References

1. All Bible references are from the New Revised Standard Version.
2. I have excluded Hebrews from Paul’s writings.
3. The Greek OT (Septuagint) uses the verb 115 times, mainly in Psalms (73 times = 62 percent), and the noun occurs 114 times (18 times = 15 percent in the Psalms and 16 times = 14 percent in Isaiah).
4. Tim Flannery’s The Weather Makers: The History and Future Impact of Climate Change (Melbourne: Text, 2005), 306.
5. See Flannery, Weather Makers, Chap. 23, "A Close-Run Thing," 213–21.

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